The 2026 Finovate Awards are right here! Celebrating one of the best and brightest in fintech and monetary providers, this yr’s awards will crown greater than 30 winners in fields corresponding to funds, lending, various investing, monetary inclusion, and extra! Nominations are actually open, so take a look at this yr’s Finovate Awards classes and submit your nomination. Submit earlier than April 24 and save $100 on the nomination payment.
This yr’s competitors might be judged by a staff of consultants from the banking, fintech, and monetary providers industries. “An award is just price one thing if the individuals giving it know their stuff, and our superb lineup of judges this yr must be thrilling for everybody concerned,” Finovate VP of Technique Greg Palmer stated, “It’s nice to see a lot expertise on the roster!”
Have a look for your self at this yr’s choice committee. Additionally becoming a member of this yr’s judging staff might be Finovate VPs Greg Palmer and Heather Stowell, together with Finovate Analysis Analysts Julie Muhn and David Penn.
Mary Wisniewski, Editor-at-Massive, Cornerstone Advisors
Wisniewski is editor-at-large at Cornerstone Advisors the place she helps form content material technique and hosts Cash Isn’t Every thing, a biweekly podcast that explores early-stage fintech concepts. She additionally writes a month-to-month editor’s be aware, Finteching with Mary, on LinkedIn.
A frequent speaker at main digital banking occasions, Wisniewski has lined fintech and digital banking for greater than 12 years, with bylines in GonzoBanker, American Banker, Bankrate, the Related Press, and extra.
Kilian Thalhammer, Managing Director, Deutsche Financial institution AG
With greater than 20 years in funds, fintech, e-commerce, and loyalty, Thalhammer is an skilled in managing essential product, technique and enterprise growth points. After being Director Options for the Swiss Publish, he joined RatePay (Otto Group) as CPO and was international CPO of PAYMILL (Rocket Web) till 2014.
Kilian is now chargeable for the enterprise unit service provider options at Deutsche Financial institution. This covers Deutsche Financial institution’s international issuing and acceptance enterprise and the enterprise with fintech, platform & expertise shoppers.
Noel Stave, Chief Know-how Officer, RBC Clearing & Custody
Stave serves as Chief Know-how Officer of RBC Clearing & Custody, the place he has constructed a 25-year profession spanning management roles throughout expertise, finance, and operations—most lately as Chief Working Officer earlier than assuming his present place in 2021.
As CTO, Stave oversees expertise product administration, expertise technique, knowledge administration, engineering, fintech partnerships, service & assist, expertise coaching, and consulting for the agency.
Lisa Gold Schier, Advisor, Studying Cooperative Financial institution
Schier is a trusted C-Suite adviser specializing in fintech analysis and go-to-market technique throughout the banking and expertise sectors. She brings deep experience in assessing monetary expertise options and guiding their profitable market entry and adoption by monetary establishments.
Schier is acknowledged for constructing and main strategic partnerships from ideation via contract negotiation to monetary establishment adoption and ongoing enterprise growth.
Glen Sarvady, Founder, 154 Advisors
Sarvady is a 25 yr veteran of the funds and fintech industries. His agency 154 Advisors gives actionable insights, data-driven evaluation and technique formulation to assist FIs navigate the quickly evolving funds panorama.
Sarvady is a former Federal Reserve Financial institution examiner and a part of the startup staff that launched the College of Pennsylvania Pupil Federal Credit score Union. He additionally managed Deluxe’s monetary providers verify and funds applications for 2 years.
Carey Ransom, Managing Director, BankTech Ventures
Ransom is an SaaS entrepreneur, government, investor, and advisor. He has began, grown, and/or led eight B2B and client SaaS firms throughout startup and progress phases.
He’s at present the Managing Director of BankTech Ventures, a strategic funding fund centered on empowering disruptive applied sciences for group banks. Based and funded by leaders locally banking world and endorsed by the ICBA (Impartial Group Bankers of America) and The Enterprise Heart, the fund received Finovate’s 2020 Accelerator of the 12 months.
Jim Perry, Senior Strategist, Market Insights
As Senior Strategist at Market Insights, Perry helps monetary establishments throughout the nation make smarter selections and unlock new paths to progress via customized analysis and data-driven technique. A trusted advisor to banks and credit score unions throughout the US, Perry brings readability to advanced challenges and a recent perspective to conversations about progress, innovation, and relevance in a quickly altering panorama.
Co-founder of the Fintech Ebook Membership and named one of many “Prime 100 Fintech Influencers” by Onalytics, Perry is an everyday on the speaker circuit at trade occasions from native associations to international conferences.
Lohith Paripati, Director of Digital Product Administration, American Categorical
Paripati is a seasoned product chief with over a decade of expertise constructing and scaling fintech and commerce platforms. He at present leads AI-driven initiatives for Walmart Market sellers, specializing in making use of generative AI to funds and monetary workflows to drive progress and effectivity at scale.
Paripati brings deep experience in funds, monetization, and platform technique, with a powerful concentrate on aligning buyer worth with enterprise outcomes.
Tiffani Montez, Principal Analyst, EMARKETER
Montez is Principal Analyst main the Analyst Entry Program for Monetary Companies at EMARKETER previously Insider Intelligence. She oversees the content material throughout Banking, which gives actionable insights on developments in how worth is saved, managed, transferred, and spent, for an viewers of prime banks and neobanks.
Her distinctive mix of expertise as a practitioner, analyst, and vendor resolution supplier offers her the muse to have the ability to present thought management to shoppers via all lenses of the monetary providers ecosystem.
William Mills III, Chief Govt Officer, William Mills Company
Mills joined the agency in 1983 and based their public relations providers in 1989 which now accounts for greater than 90% of their billings. He serves as lead marketing consultant for the company’s shoppers and has personally suggested greater than 500 C-level executives on advertising and marketing technique, enterprise growth, mergers and acquisitions, firm branding and public relations.
Mills’ different tasks embody company monetary administration, consumer consulting and main enterprise growth and advertising and marketing providers for the company.
Eric McCabe, Head of Embedded Finance, Residents
McCabe serves as Head of Embedded Finance at Residents. On this capability he guides the financial institution’s effort to embed Residents monetary merchandise in third-party platforms utilized by Residents prospects, and to allow platforms, manufacturers, and fintechs to offer monetary providers to their prospects, backed by Residents.
Previous to becoming a member of Residents, McCabe held roles in Embedded Funds, Fintech Technique, Product and Operations at SVB and Citi.
Suraj Manjunath, Govt Director, Funding Banking Know-how, JP Morgan
Manjunath is a senior product chief shaping the way forward for funding banking via AI-driven innovation. He’s skilled in main giant, cross-functional groups to drive strategic change and unlock progress, effectivity, and aggressive benefit throughout the worldwide funding banking ecosystem.
Manjunath focuses on making use of synthetic intelligence, automation, and data-led perception to reimagine how monetary establishments function, make selections, and ship worth.
Luther Liang, SVP, Head of Product, Grasshopper Financial institution
Liang leads the technique and execution behind fintech merchandise that empower small companies, customers, business enterprises, and fintech (Banking-as-a-Service) companions.
Grasshopper’s product roadmap to delivered the financial institution a premium exit at ~2.5x tangible e-book worth $369M acquisition by Enova Worldwide in December 2025 that considerably outperformed the 1.5x trade median.
Sam Kilmer, Managing Director, Cornerstone Advisors
Kilmer leads Cornerstone Advisors’ fintech advisory apply working with trade suppliers, fintechs, and buyers. He additionally leads selective technique engagements with banks and credit score unions. Sam’s prior expertise contains management at two monetary tech corporations and two midsize banks together with digital banking, advertising and marketing, analytics, implementations, partnerships, and technique.
Kilmer is a nationally sought-after speaker, trade analysis writer, host of Fintech Hustle podcast, and a contributor to GonzoBanker and the trade press.
Bruno Jivan, Head of Innovation and Analysis, Novobanco
Jivan is Director of Innovation & Analysis at novobanco. He has broad and diversified expertise throughout the monetary sector, together with credit score evaluation, threat, venture finance, M&A, product, advertising and marketing, transformation and innovation.
In his present function, he focuses on fostering innovation tradition and mindset, strengthening connections with the fintech ecosystem, and main the big‑scale adoption of AI throughout the group to ship sensible, buyer‑centric influence.
Nicolai Farcas, Chief Know-how Officer, Client, Small & Enterprise Banking Digital, Wells Fargo Financial institution
Farcas is a senior government chief with over 25 years of expertise driving enterprise technique, transformation, and execution throughout international monetary providers organizations. He focuses on Client and Small Enterprise Banking, together with the Transfer Cash portfolio, enterprise PMO management, and large-scale enterprise and expertise transformation initiatives.
Throughout his tenure at Wells Fargo, Nicolai has held senior management roles together with International C-Suite Govt, Chief Know-how Officer, and Head of the Undertaking Administration Workplace (PMO).
Sam Das, Managing Director, TruStage Ventures
Das is Managing Director of TruStage Ventures, the enterprise capital arm of TruStage. Since becoming a member of, Das has centered on sourcing, investing and advising early-stage fintech and insurtech startups. He’s additionally the Vice President of Company Growth at TruStage, evaluating and executing a broad vary of strategic transactions for the group. Das joined TruStage in 2017.
Previous to becoming a member of TruStage, Das was the founder and CEO of a fintech startup and served as an funding banker at corporations together with Houlihan Lokey and Fox-Pitt, Kelton.
Sushma Daggubati, Supervisor of Product Administration, Mastercard
Since 2016, and over her eight years at Mastercard, Daggubati has constantly progressed to more difficult positions each two years from launch administration to software program engineering, resulting in her present place, denoting an distinctive skill to transition from pure technical roles to extra business ones.
She has additionally contributed to the trade by creating a number of patents which have been cited by a number of the world’s largest and most prestigious corporations together with Shopify, Walmart, and Worldpay.
Soner Canko, Founder, SC Administration Advisory
Canko graduated from the School of Political Sciences at Istanbul College, the place he additionally earned his Grasp’s and PhD levels. He started his profession in multinational companies, holding numerous roles at Procter & Gamble, Citibank, Hewlett-Packard (HP), and First Information.
Acknowledged for his work in monetary applied sciences, Canko at present serves as a administration marketing consultant and unbiased board member. He’s additionally actively concerned within the following platforms: Turkish Enterprise Establishments, FinTech Istanbul, Blockchain Türkiye.
Tanya Andreasyan, Managing Director and Editor-in-Chief, FinTech Futures
Andreasyan is MD and Editor-in-Chief of FinTech Futures, the definitive supply of intelligence for the worldwide fintech sector. An skilled journalist and a long-term resident of the fintech ecosystem, she has in depth understanding and information of the trade and its individuals.
With in-depth protection of fintech points on a worldwide scale, FinTech Futures is a number one useful resource for expertise consumers, sellers, builders, integrators and different specialists throughout the sector.
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